Presently Raymond looked ahead through his binoculars and jerked the bell lanyard impatiently.
‘Group up!’ he called down the shaft.
‘Grouped up, sir,’ came the answer.
The subdued churning of the twin screws ceased and as suddenly started with redoubled energy as the batteries came in series, thrashing up the water astern and causing the boat to vibrate fore and aft as she leapt forward to the touch of the grouper switch.
Down in the electric lit interior the L.T.O.[2] and an S.T.[3] were working the motor switches, ‘making and breaking’ in obedience to the telegraph lights, to which the ‘Claxtons’ called attention. Right aft in the engine-room the Chief E.R.A.[4] was hovering over the tail shafts with an oil can and a lump of dirty waste, with the air of a demon of the revels.
Forward of him were the air compressors and main motors, and the engine clutches, and then the great eight-cylinder Diesel engines, a mass of burnished steel and brasswork in a narrow electric lit tunnel. The faint hum of the motors and the smell of fuel oil pervaded the air, but the cheery faces of the stokers on watch robbed the scene of its romance.
One of them who was whistling ‘Tennessee’ three tones flat, and bending over a clutch with a dignified expression, straightened up as a man came down the engine-room hatch.
‘’Ere, Sam, you remember that gell wot——’ he began.
‘’Strewth,’ quoth the new-comer. ‘Ain’t it got dark sudden?’
‘It usually does,’ broke in another voice from behind the engine, ‘at night-time.’